View full sizeRandy L. Rasmussen/The OregonianPortland Mayor Sam Adams talks about drug crime data in a meeting Tuesday with neighborhood and business leaders from Old Town and Chinatown. Adams said he wants to move forward with several potential solutions to curb drug crime in Old Town, including a revised Drug Free Zone.

Mayor Sam Adams
announced plans Tuesday to implement a revised Drug and Prostitution
Free Exclusion Zone to help curb drug activity in Portland
neighborhoods, including Old Town.

At a meeting with business and neighborhood leaders from Old Town and Chinatown, Adams said he wants to ask Multnomah County Circuit Court
judges to order people convicted of drug crimes to stay out of areas
considered "hot zones" for drug activity or face additional
probation-violation charges.

"We are going to move forward and hopefully come to an agreement with
the county to have court-imposed stay-away orders in illegal drug impact
areas," Adams said.

The boundaries of the impact areas will be decided by the Multnomah County district attorney's officebased on crime data, along with input from police and the communities, and Adams said Old Town likely would be included. Adams also presented a number of other possible solutions to decrease drug activity in Old Town.

In two weeks, he said he will ask the City Council to approve giving the district attorney's office money to hire a deputy district attorney who would focus solely on prosecuting drug crimes in high-impact areas. Currently, the office doesn't have enough staff to fill the job.

The Portland Police Bureau also is offering a number of proposed solutions. To help keep convicted drug dealers and users out of the high-impact zones, the bureau will ask the county to give authority to officers working in the zones to arrest people for probation violations. Typically, only probation officers can approve such arrests, which takes time, said Mike Kuykendall, director of the bureau's services branch. He said the county has an agreement in place giving similar authority to officers working on Southeast 82nd Avenue.

"The county's Department of Community Justice has already expressed an interest with working with us on this with prostitution," Kuykendall said. "This one would be a great one for us and them because they have limited resources as probation officers and we have limited resources for police."

Portland police plan to park a large, mobile precinct in Old Town this week to bolster police presence.

To cut down on illegal activity, Adams said he asked Portland Parks & Recreation not to reopen two public restroom facilities on West Burnside and Southwest Ankeny this summer. He also said the city would be looking at partnering with TriMet to see about at adding more security at the transit mall in Old Town, including playing music and installing video cameras.

The neighborhood leaders at the meeting voiced no objections to the ideas. Howard Weiner, owner of Cal Skate Skateboards and an Old Town-Chinatown Neighborhood Association board member, said the proposed solutions Adams presented match the suggestions the association submitted to the city.

"Essentially, we received from the mayor's office relief on each and every issue we put forward," Weiner said. "My hope is that the county will work as closely with the city as the city is now working with the community."